The row over maternity units in Bolton and Bury has been central to much of the campaiging in Bolton North East with Labour and the Conservatives engaged in a war of words.

It all stemmed from a visit to Bury by shadow health secretary Andrew Lansley last year when he said the Tories would save the Fairfield Hospital Maternity Unit, which is due to close as part of the Making It Better review and replaced with a £20 million super-centre at the Royal Bolton Hospital.

Labour have since put out leaflets saying that this was equal to Lansley saying work would be halted on the state-of-the-art Bolton centre.

Today, I met up with Lansley during a visit to the Royal Bolton and what he had to say should put the record straight for both sides.

I know some people are unhappy at the tone of some of the campaigning but for me issues like this are what makes General Election campaigns so fascinating.

That jockeying for position, claims and counter claims being thrown backwards and forwards may not be helpful for voters still to make their decision but for us hacks it provides us with plenty of copy and no shortage of letters for our letters page.

I also had the pleasure of meeting Barroness Glenys Kinnock who was in Bolton and quite happy to chat about her husband Neil and how he would love to be taking part in this campaign.

You can read my interview with her in tomorrow's The Bolton News.

Don't forget you can keep up to date with the General Election - and the Bolton Council election - on my Twitter page.

Just log onto www.twitter.com/AndrewGreavesBN and click the follow button.